From mud huts, umqomboti and straightback to penthouses, expensive weaves and moet!

Growing Up – Chapter 61

I never wanted a long engagement but I certainly didn’t want a short one. I didn’t want to get married in a Month. I needed some time to plan the wedding, a few months not a few weeks. What kind of a man takes such decisions about a wedding alone? We never really spoke about the kind of wedding we want to have, where we want to have it and how many guests we want. All of the important decisions should be joint decisions. Next thing he will be choosing my wedding gown, he probably has!

“Wait, why are we getting married in a Month?”

“Is it too far? We can always move it closer baby.”

“No it’s too close. It’s really unfair of you to make such a decision alone. We are partners, equals and we should make all decisions together.”

He chuckled and said “Equals? Listen to me clearly Hlengiwe. We aren’t partners or equals, yes we are partners in the romantic sense, but in reality there is no equality or partnership between us. I am the man, the head, the boss in this relationship. I can make all the decisions alone if I want to because I am the one who will be coughing out the money. You will start making the decisions if you will pay for the wedding, the house we will live in, the cars we will drive and the holidays we will go to. You must learn to know your place before we get married, I will not tolerate having a wife that will second guess all the decisions. You know that the Word of God instruct you women to be submissive to your husbands, so I will expect complete submission from you, Mam’fundisi.”

I couldn’t believe that he belittled me and made me feel like nothing, and then he covers that up by using the Word of God.

“Okay I’m sorry baby I didn’t mean to upset you, it’s just that I expected you to inform me about such big decisions. I’m also worried that I will not have time to plan everything properly in a Month.”

“I’m informing you now aren’t I? You don’t have to worry about planning everything, I hired a brilliant wedding planner months ago. I can never trust you to plan a wedding baby, how would you manage? Shame you can’t even manage your little beauty business, a big wedding would totally mess you up. The only thing you have to do is to go and buy your wedding gown” After saying that, he just laughed and shook his head.

Within a matter of a few minutes, he managed to break me down completely. I wanted to cry but I had to be strong because he once made it clear to me that he doesn’t like women who cry. “Your tears don’t move me, but a strong woman…..yeah that moves me.” He said one day because I cried in front of him. I wonder what his definition of a strong woman is because according to him a strong woman doesn’t cry.

Anyway I decided to not fight him regarding the wedding day and the hiring of a wedding planner without consulting me. But I needed clarity on some issues, so I asked him whether I can chose my bride’s maids’ dresses, and his response shocked me

“Baby you will not have any bride’s maids, you can only have a maid of honour, only because you need someone by your side. If it were totally up to me, we wouldn’t even have a best man and maid of honour because Adam and Eve didn’t have any of those in the Garden of Eden.”

Hahahaahahaha this man was weird, getting weird by the day. How can he compare us to Adam and Eve? I’m getting married to a mad man.

He stayed over for a few more hours, when I tried to initiate sex with him, he rejected my advances by saying

“Baby we shouldn’t fornicate, we will only have sex after our wedding. I want you to be pure on the night of our wedding. I want us to miss each other, so that we can enjoy making love on the night of the wedding.”

Heeeeeeee we have been fornicating even before our relationship began but now he is telling me that he doesn’t want us to fornicate mxm…….this man is a hypocrite of note. But I wasn’t going to argue with him because it’s better if I agree with him than to argue with him. He left soon after that, saying we shouldn’t spend a lot of time together before our wedding.

After he left I decided to go sleep, while in bed I found myself crying. I don’t know why I was crying, I was supposed to be happy because my wedding was in a few weeks, I was in love and everything was going well in my life. Yes, Apostle wasn’t the easiest man to deal with and he made me feel like a fool sometimes, but it’s only because he loves me so much and wants the best for me. Maybe I was crying because I missed my sister and I wished she was still around. But I didn’t have anyone to talk to about how much I missed y sister, because Apostle Bae didn’t seem interested whenever I spoke about memories of my sister.

“Let the dead remain dead sweetheart, you can’t move on with your life if you keep on missing your sister. You are not the only person who has lost a loved one, so you must get over it.” He once said when I told him that I missed my sister. So from there on I knew that I was never going to be able to talk about my sister again, especially to him.

The next day I woke up early and made breakfast, I had to tell Sihle about the new developments regarding my wedding. She took the day from work because she wanted to recover from Thando’s wedding. While I was still busy, I received a message from Philani’s mother, she asked to come to her house because she wanted t talk about something. I didn’t want to go but I didn’t really have a choice because I didn’t want to look disrespectful.When I was done, I went to wake her up and she came to the kitchen after a few minutes.

“You haven’t made a big breakfast in a while, what’s the occasion Mahlengy?”

“I’m getting married.”

“Oh wow that is very interesting, I didn’t know all along that you are getting married.” she said in a sarcastic manner.

I just laughed and told her that Apostle Bae was paying lobola in a week and our wedding was going to take place in a Month.

She chocked on her food, then said “Haw Hlengy just last night we were talking about your wedding and you made it clear that you need a lot of time to plan it and you will probably have it 6 Months from now. There isn’t enough time for us to plan your wedding. Oh my goodness Hlengiwe how are we going to do this? When did you take the decision to get married so soon?”

“Calm down Sihle, I wasn’t the one who decided that the wedding will take place this soon. My man and his family took the decision, he hired a wedding planner and he is the one who will cover all the wedding costs. All we have to do is find the perfect wedding gown for me and a dress for you, so we really don’t have anything to worry about.”

“Okay,” she said, “so this man decided on a wedding date without your consent and hired a wedding planner. Have you met with the wedding planner? Does the wedding planner know what you want? You need to call him right now and ask him to give you the wedding planner’s number. I am only available today, so we need to see her today.”

She was right, I couldn’t trust a stranger with my wedding, so I needed to get the wedding planner’s number and have some input in all the wedding planning. I then called Apostle Bae, he only answered his phone when I called for the 3rd time and he was breathing heavily, very heavily

“Hey Hlengiwe, what do you need sweetheart?”

“Hey baby, why are you breathing heavily? Were you busy?”

“Yes I was kind of busy, I just came back from jogging.”

“You were jogging!” I exclaimed, “I didn’t know you jogged. Anyway the reason I called is because I need you to give me the wedding planner’s number. Not that I don’t trust your judgement, I just want to ……..”

He cut me before I could finish

“Okay I will send you the number…..oh and I always jog Hlengy, it is important for me to keep fit. We will talk later, I have to go now. Enjoy your day.” After saying that, he hung up.

He sent then number soon after that, I called the planner and we agreed to meet in the evening, I then sent the wedding planner directions to my house. We ate our breakfast, when we were done I had to go to see Philani’s mom. I wasn’t looking forward to meeting her, but I was really curious.

When I arrived at Philani’s home, there were his sisters’ cars outside. I was very nervous to go in because I knew how feisty his sisters were and I knew how much they loved me or rather how much they used to love me. I don’t know how they feel about me because I hadn’t seen them since I broke up with Philani.

Philani’s family were very high class but they didn’t hesitate to deal with anyone who made one of them a fool. Philani once told me that when they were in their teens, their father had an affair with a young girl. Their father was a very respectable man in the community and his affair dented his and his wife’s reputation. His sister’s didn’t waste any time, they went to the girl’s house and they beat her up. The affair came to an end and the father never had an affair ever again, or so they thought.

I got out of the car and slowly walked to the door, before I could knock I heard one of his sister’s saying

“We must teach this girl a lesson, you don’t mess with the Mazibuko’s and get away with it. She must be dealt with.”

I then heard another one say

“You are correct sisi, we can’t allow people to treat us like fools. I am going to beat her up until she turns purple on the face. If we kill her, we will just burn her body and scatter her ashes.” After saying this, they all laughed.

After I heard this, I walked back to my car because I knew my life was in danger, I was not going to let these people kill me or mess up my beautiful face. Before I reached the gate, someone opened the door and screamed

“ Yey wena Hlengiwe, we have been waiting for you. Where do you think you are going?”